Thursday, December 3, 2020 - The Daily Cardinal

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University of Wisconsin-Madison

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Thursday, December 3, 2020

The politics of weed

Rain Gardens

+SCIENCE, page 9

+OPINION, page 5

Lawmakers fractured over COVID-19 relief By Hope Karnopp STATE NEWS EDITOR

Assembly Republicans unveiled new COVID-19 legislation Tuesday that did not gain immediate support among Senate Republicans and prompted criticism from Democrats. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, announced the plan, which among other provisions, would require state employees to return to work by Jan. 31, according to a Legislative Fiscal Bureau analysis. Employees could provide a doctor’s note for an exemption until two months after a COVID19 vaccine becomes widely available. The provision does not apply to UW system employees. The plan would also require teachers to instruct students from school buildings unless they submit an exemption. If passed, it would require a twothirds vote from school boards to extend virtual instruction, which would only last for two weeks at a time, and require payments of $371 pack to parents if instruction is virtual for half of the semester. “Speaker Vos is willing to gamble with the lives of hardworking Wisconsinites in a brazen attempt to score political points. While essential workers protect our children and show up to staff pris-

ons, mental health facilities and hospitals, the Republican caucus went missing in action,” Executive Director of AFSCME Wisconsin Patrick Wycoff said in a press release. AFSCME Wisconsin is a union that represents public employees at the state, county and municipal level. The proposal would also add significant powers to the Republican-controlled state budget committee, which saw a leadership shakeup after its co-chair Rep. John Nygren, R-Marinette, resigned Tuesday. It requires the state Department of Health Services to submit a COVID-19 distribution plan to the committee, which it could block, and gives the committee oversight over federal COVID-19 funding. The proposal would also require UW System schools to offer students opportunities to gain course credit if they “assist Wisconsin in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic,” through eligible volunteer or work activities. The package also seeks to double the number of public health workers responding to the pandemic, expand at-home rapid antigen tests and require the Department of Workforce Development to eliminate the backlog of unemployment insurance claims. Assembly Minority Leader Gordon Hintz, D-Oshkosh, called

the bill “politically driven” in a statement Tuesday. “There are so many extremely politically divisive items in this legislation at a time when we need the opposite. Not only do Wisconsin Republicans not want to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, they want to put into law limits on local governments in their ability to respond in the way that works for their community,” Hintz said. Competing proposals Incoming Senate Majority Leader Devin LaMahieu, R-Oostburg, unveiled a separate, less extensive Senate proposal Wednesday seeking to tap the state’s medical assistance fund surplus to maintain the DHS’ response to COVID-19. “The transfer of surplus funds presents an opportunity to act immediately and work together with the Governor on a unified, effective response to our shared hardship,” LaMahieu said in a press release. Evers proposed his own COVID-19 package two weeks ago, which is more expensive than Vos’ package and would prohibit evictions, a provision unlikely to pass in the Assembly. Evers, Vos and LaMahieu virtually met again Tuesday, two weeks after they met to discuss relief. The Republican-controlled legislature

has not passed legislation since April. In a media briefing Tuesday, Evers said he wants the legislature to convene in mid-December rather than waiting for the new session to begin in January. In a press release, Vos said Assembly Republicans are “ready to act” before the end of the year, when CARES Act funding expires, and added that

AP that he has not yet studied Vos’ proposals and plans to meet with Evers again Thursday. Evers’ spokeswoman Britt Cudaback said “it’s unfortunate that Republicans can’t even agree among themselves on a plan for our state’s response to this pandemic.” Bipartisan lawmakers urge caution On the same day Evers and legislative leaders met to dis-

COURTESY OF WILL CIOCI, KATIE EGGERS AND DEVIN LAMAHIEU

Robin Vos unveiled legislation, Senate proposed to activate existing state funding. Wisconsin needs a “comprehensive response” to the pandemic. However, LaMahieu said that among Senate Republicans “there’s pretty broad support for not coming in,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. He also told the

cuss relief legislation, Wisconsin reported a single-day record of 107 deaths among confirmed COVID19 cases. New cases have dropped in recent days, but testing also

Lawmakers page 3

UW-Madison Primate Research Lab’s history of complaints By Alexa Heller STAFF WRITER

A recent complaint against the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center (WNPRC) over mistreatment of animal research subjects at UW-Madison is just one item in a decades-long list of grievances animal rights groups have brought against the laboratory. The WNPRC’s mission is to increase individual’s understanding of basic primate biology and to improve human and animal health and quality of life through research. Based in the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate Education at UW-Madison, the center is part of the National Primate Research Centers program that has been funded by the National Institutes of Health since 1961. The WNRPC has strong research and teaching links to the UW-Madison Schools or Colleges of Medicine and Public Health, Letters and Science, Agriculture and Life Sciences, and Veterinary Medicine. The WNPRC has approximately

1,600 animals that are cared for by 190 employees and 190 UW-Madison veterinary, post-doc, graduate, undergraduate and research trainees. The center serves more than 150 scientists and clinicians from around the world. It also has a long history of complaints from animal rights groups. In 1989, UW-Madison’s Richard Weindruch conducted a study depriv-

ing monkeys of 30 percent of needed calories to see if this would increase their longevity. The idea behind the study was to see if the monkeys lived longer, healthier lives by eating a lot less than maybe people, their evolutionary cousins, would eat. When the studies were first made public in 2009, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), an international activist group with

COURTESY OF GOOGLE MAPS

The WNPRC has a history of complaints from various animal rights groups

a mission of stopping all animal research, filed a formal complaint with the U.S. Department of Agriculture for the university’s violations of the Animal Welfare Act. PETA claims the monkeys were kept in a semi-starved state, imprisoned and isolated in tiny barren cages. UW-Madison has been cited for neglect of animals in multiple reports by the United States Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health inspection service. A 2004 inspection report revealed that a family of three marmosets were “found dead inside of their nesting box after the cage was sent through the cage washer.” The monkeys were believed to be killed with scalding-hot water. A 2014 inspection report shows that a marmoset monkey died during surgery because of a malfunctioning anesthesia machine. The same report showed a macaque monkey was burned by a malfunctioning heat lamp and another strangled to death when she became tangled in a chain attached to her cage. That same year, the university was

fined more than $35,000 for seven violations of federal animal-welfare laws. A 2016 inspection report shows that three monkeys were dehydrated after the drinking water supply line to their cage became disconnected. The monkeys required specialized IV fluid therapy and one of the monkeys had to be euthanized. UW-Madison was also fined $74,000 in April by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for 28 violations of federal animal research treatment standards from March 2015 to April 2019. Most recently, PETA filed a complaint on Sept. 2 with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Institutes of Health, claiming six types of animal welfare violations from March through Sept. 1. According to the allegations, monkeys had persistent diarrhea and traumatic injuries, some of which involved or led to amputations of a finger or toes. Staff separated infants from mothers and failed to prevent “accidental

Primates, page 3

“…the great state University of Wisconsin should ever encourage that continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found.”


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